


The Reincarnation Support Group

by kjate95



Category: Naruto
Genre: BAMF Dai-nana-han | Team 7 (Naruto), Because my OC wants to waterbend, Bookclub, Drama, Hatake Kakashi is so Done, Hurt/Comfort, No Uchiha Massacre, Reincarnation, She is very confused, Support Group, Team Bonding, Team Work Makes The Dream Work, multiple oc - Freeform, sasuke is more emotionally stable
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-14 05:35:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29787219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kjate95/pseuds/kjate95
Summary: What was happening?! She hadn’t changed anything, not one single thing, and yet the whole of the world seemed to be following the wrong storyline, and she was somehow at the centre of it. Now she’d been invited to a strange book club made up of some really random people, and they were speaking English?!Nikko likes her independence, dislikes drama and wants to make it past 30 years old this time around. Maybe with the help of her new support group they’ll make it through Naruto’s formative years with their limbs, eyes and mental health intact.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	1. Chapter 1

!

Her life re-began like many before her from many alternative dimensions; Nikko Sato was reincarnated and thus reborn into the Naruto-verse.

She was an orphan, with no clan name or family jitsu, and clearly a background character with no distinguishing features. Brown hair, brown eyes, pale skin and an average face. Not ugly but not pretty; just kind of boring.

She grew up in the Konoha orphanage as a normal child with a funny feeling in the back of her head as if she’d done all this before. She began to have dreams of other worlds; a girl living a normal life with a normal family, loved ones and lovers, an education, and a multitude of hobbies and interests. At first, she was confused, and it wasn’t until she was about six that she realized why all these dreams seemed familiar; they were memories.

She had lived and died before. She was a reincarnated soul and now she lived in the Naruto Universe, with the five shinobi nations, magic, chakra and stuff. That was pretty cool. The hidden leaf village full of ninja, explosions, hidden organisations and massacres. And killing people, and people killing kids, and kids killing people. And giant chakra monsters stuffed into blond-haired little boys that she’d seen running around the orphanage sometimes.

Shit.

!

A year after this unfathomable revelation she entered the academy.

‘Okay’, she thought to herself, ‘I just have to not die. I mean, you didn’t exactly manage that the first time under much more favourable circumstances, but let’s give it a shot and try to make it to… 30, yeah, that sounds reasonable. I didn’t make it there last time so that’s a good goal.’

Nikko found her thoughts amusingly morbid. 30, by her previous life’s standards, was a very short life span. She thought on her past-life sparsely, supressing it to the back of her mind where she wouldn’t have to face the all-encompassing grief that stirred in her chest when she thought of her loved ones. Her parents, her husband, her siblings, her friends; these were no-go thoughts.

Don’t think about them. You’ll cry on your first day of school and that’s not cool.

Nikko saw a little civilian girl burst into tears as her mother left her hurriedly at the school gates, clearly late for work herself.

Yeah, that’s not cool. Don’t be that girl, suck it up.

If she sniffled a little bit no one noticed.

But school, again, really?

She’d been a successful engineer in her previous life, had gone to school for a long time to achieve her qualifications, so she thought it was a little unfair she had to do it all over again. Granted, she wasn’t yet very good at reading the Japanese characters that everything was written in here. Nor did she have much of an in-depth knowledge about how the village ran, what shinobi really did, the geography or history of the rest of the world…

But she could do math! It was probably the same in this world. Hopefully.

Part of the deal of being an orphan in a hidden village was going to the academy and learning to be a shinobi. Nikko, therefore, had come to terms with her fate of being a ninja. Which wasn’t hard because, if she was being honest with herself, it was pretty cool the whole using magic thing and jumping across buildings and just generally being a badass in a world that wanted you dead. I mean, she’d cross the whole ‘murder-for-hire’ bridge when she came to it. Or the whole ‘you’ll-die-young’ thing, but she had a goal of 30 and she would reach it, god dammit.

Nikko walked into her designated class and sat in the middle; a very average and normal seat. She wasn’t a shady kid sitting at the back or a mega-keen-nerd sitting in the front seat, just a normal little orphan girl that would be overlooked by the teacher very easily. She would obviously exceed in any subject knowledge, having the intelligence of an adult, and didn’t want to be pegged as a genius or given special attention. She liked easy so that was her goal for the academy, drama free and easy.

When all the children were seated the teacher, Iruka-sensei, settled the class and began the introductory lessons. There were a few disruptive children which Nikko recognised very quickly; Kiba Inuzuka and Naruto Uzumaki being the main two. There were a number of clan children as expected; Sasuke Uchiha looking weirdly enthusiastic in the corner (wasn’t he supposed to be grumpy?) and the mop of pink hair which was a tiny Sakura Haruno at the front sitting next to a pretty blond Ino Yamanaka, to name a few.

This is what Nikko expected. Lots of tiny characters from a TV show she used to watch, running around and training to be killers. Great, sure, let’s not think about it too much.

Lunch was weird and Nikko was dragged into a game of ninja with some of the other kids. She played half-heartedly and by the end of lunch had made friends with a group of civilian kids, and just decided to go with it. There were worse ways to spend her lunch times and she was only 7 so if she enjoyed running around playing a childish game then no one would question her.

When Nikko learned about the genin apartments she found a new determination she didn’t realize she had. Orphans in the academy could opt for an apartment in the genin block if they showed enough promise in their first year of studies. So, she decided to get an apartment; living in the orphanage was cramped and, although the adults left the children to themselves most of the time, she didn’t appreciate the lack of independence.

Getting to be one of the top students in the class was easier than she thought. The written tests were a complete breeze once she’d gotten to grips with the language and the physical training was hardly a challenge either. She sometimes had to stop herself from feeling smug about it as she was up against children whereas she had the critical thinking of an adult; it wasn’t exactly a fair playing field.

She thought she might trip up in the sparring and kunai practise but, again, she didn’t appreciate how much having an abundance of knowledge could help; learning was so much easier when you had the basics down already. Taijitsu was just about physical conditioning and repeated katas; boring for the children but completely easy for her. Strategy in sparring was child’s play; literally. Usually, her partners tended to project their movements from miles away and didn’t think past the first strike. Kunai mechanics were hard at first but practising it with a logical and thought through approach (rather than the blind throwing that the other children were doing) meant it wasn’t long until she hit the target every time.

She did have to admit that ninjitsu was an otherworldly experience that no amount of foreknowledge would have prepared her for, but if all she had to do to improve her chakra control was meditation and deep breathing then she could do that. She was on par with, if not better than, most of the clan children, which would more than put her in the upper sections of the class ranks.

Life was pretty easy all things considered and unsurprisingly within the year she had the apartment.

It was a tiny studio living space with a bed under the window, a little round breakfast table in the middle of the room, a tiny open kitchen on one side of the wall and a door to the shower room on the other one.

When she opened her front door after her first night of freedom, ready to set off to the academy for the day, she heard her neighbour in the apartment opposite step out their door too. After locking up she turned to greet her neighbour, and was faced with none other than Naruto Uzumaki.

Of course, out of 500 apartments in the complex, hers was the one right next to Naruto’s. Not that she minded the boy, just it was a little overwhelming being around the person the entire universe was named after. Also, he was really hyper. But seriously, what were the odds.

“Oh, hey Naruto,” Nikko said, offering a closed lip smile. Naruto jumped a little bit at being addressed and turned from locking his own door with wide eyed surprise. The small amount of apprehension, bordering on fear, that flittered across Naruto’s face for a split second made her feel uncomfortable. She knew that he’d been removed from the orphanage when she was around 6, before all her memories had returned, and had been moved to his own apartment shortly afterwards. No one had ever mentioned Naruto at the orphanage, but the nurses that looked after them seemed to be relieved that he was no longer around.

When he caught sight of her, he blinked a few times and then smiled brightly. “Hey, you must be my new neighbour,” he said, scratching the back of his head nervously, “That apartment can’t seem to keep a tenant for long. In fact, most on this floor seem to have that problem. Nice to meet you, I’m Naruto Uzumaki!”

Nikko gave Naruto an eyeroll. “Yeah, I know, we’re in the same class at school. I’m Nikko Sato.” She didn’t wait for his reply and began walking down the corridor to the stairs. Naruto caught up to her as she reached the street and turned on the road towards the academy building.

“You’re in my class?” He asked, walking next to Nikko and scrutinizing her face with squinted eyes. “I don’t know, I’ve never seen you before.” Nikko spent the remainder of the walk trying to convince Naruto that she was in his class and, yes, she did see his prank on Iruka-sensei last week and, no, she didn’t have a special awesome invisibility jitsu that meant he hadn’t seen her before.

Naruto was cautious of Nikko for the first few days but when he realized she didn’t call him names and didn’t care that much about living opposite him, he warmed up to her. They were friends of convenience and neither would have made an effort to reach out had fate not made them neighbours, but that didn’t stop a tentative friendship from forming. Of course, Nikko was far too relaxed and mature for the mega hyper attention-seeking Naruto and she tried not to encourage their friendship too much, recognising Naruto as the drama magnet he was. Apart from walking to the academy together every morning, they didn’t really hang out. But she did nag him about vegetables and was pleased to see that when he next returned from grocery shopping, he had some extra things in his carrier bag than just cup ramen.

!

When Nikko was eight, there was some kind of civil war within the Uchiha clan which resulted in half the clan getting wiped out in one night. Everyone was surprised and shocked to hear that the Uchiha elders had been planning a coup to overthrow the Hokage and take over the village. It was said that at the last minute some of the Uchiha turned their back on the plan, leading to a wave effect of uncertainty within their ranks. The plan was slipped to the Hokage and action was taken to prevent war within the village. Most of the shinobi population of the clan was killed, minus those few who stood against the plan, and the uprising had come to a swift and decisive end.

Nikko was shocked. Not about the coup or the significant death toll, they were to be expected, but she distinctly remembered the word ‘massacre’ being thrown out in the original storyline. It was a major plot point in fact. Originally everyone had been killed baring Sasuke and his older brother Itachi.

And then wasn’t there something about Madara Uchiha, or was it Obito? And Danzo?

What was going on?

!

“Team 7: Sasuke Uchiha, Naruto Uzumaki and Nikko Sato.”

What?

What?!

More names and a blur of activity happened around Nikko as her brain short circuited and an intense nausea raised to the back of her throat.

She didn’t do enough for this, nothing she did could have resulted in this. It made no sense. None!

She was on team 7? How?

“Well, it’s tradition to put the top kunoichi and shinobi together on the same team,” Iruka said, startling her out of her dissociative episode. Apparently, she’d said that out loud. “And the third member is always the, err…”

Iruka glanced awkwardly at Naruto.

“Dead last,” Sasuke spat, gritting his teeth and sneering in Naruto’s direction. It was a lot of emotion for the supposedly moody boy she had expected to be faced with, but she hadn’t paid Sasuke much attention than a cursory acknowledgement over the years.

Wait, she’d been top kunoichi? Dammit, she’d forgotten about the whole team 7 thing. That position was supposed to go to Sakura, how was she supposed to remember something insignificant like that. Oh no, now she was worried about what else she’d unintentionally forgotten.

This is a nightmare!

“Hey teme, it doesn’t matter where I came in the ranking, if I can still kick your ass!” Naruto shouted from Nikko’s left, directly into her ear. If she hadn’t shaken out of her funk yet, Naruto’s screeching voice was sure to do it. “Hey Nikko, looks like we’re on a team together! Shame we have to be with the bastard.”

Iruka gave Nikko a sympathetic look. She glared back with accusation and blame as she sat miserably between Sasuke and Naruto bickering over the top of her head, and slouched lower into her chair. When had they even moved to sit next to her? Or maybe she was just a barrier for them at this point.

Apparently, the room had emptied out for lunch while she’d been dying inside. “So…” she started, but the words seemed to get stuck. She cleared her throat and spoke louder to get the two boys’ attention. “So, I suppose we should have a team lunch?”

Sasuke gave her a disgusted look at the suggestion and left the room promptly.

“Ah I’m sorry Nikko, I need to go find Sakura-chan! I can’t believe we’re not on the same team!” and with that Naruto ran out the room too.

She couldn’t deny it stung a little bit to get ditched by two 12-year-olds.

She was cool, right?

!

After lunch the jounin-senseis came to collect their new teams and, rather unsurprisingly, the last group left was Team 7. Iruka looked extremely put out by this news and eventually had to leave them to wait on their own after an hour.

Kakashi turned up eventually and Nikko didn’t even try to attempt to stop Naruto from pranking him with the chalkboard eraser. It fell on the jounin’s head with a clatter and after a slow blink he predicably said:

“My first impression of you is that… I hate you.” Nikko sighed in relief; at least some things went according to what she expected.

They found themselves on the roof 10 minutes later, talking about themselves. Kakashi’s mysterious speech followed by Naruto’s ramen obsessed speech were as expected, but Sasuke’s was a whole lot different; which she really should have seen coming.

“I’m Sasuke Uchiha, I like tomatoes and my older brother. I hate betrayal and miso. My dream is to become the chief of police so that I can keep the village safe from betrayal.” Sasuke said his piece and crossed his arms, as if he hadn’t just announced he wouldn’t be a revenge mongering sociopath. Kakashi did a weird eye smile at the boy.

Nikko swallowed a lump in her throat. Sure, she knew Itachi Uchiha (one of the few shinobi to have survived what was now being called ‘The Uchiha Cull’) had taken over the clan when his father had been ‘removed’, and so there was significantly more stability and less torture than would have happened otherwise to the youngest Uchiha, but she’d still expected some bitter resentment and intense drive.

However, what she found in front was her was that Sasuke was… stable. It was a shock.  
Team 7 were all looking at her and waiting for her introduction. She stalled for time by clearing her throat.

“I’m Nikko Sato… I like my independence. I don’t like… drama. My dream is to make it past 30 years old.”

Kakashi’s eyes lingered on Nikko for a moment as he gave her his weird eye smile. Perhaps announcing her fear of her own mortality wasn’t the best choice for first impressions.

!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, I'm Kate nice to meet you. This has been bouncing around my brain for a while now and I thought I'd give it a go. It'll be mostly quite fast paced and the chapters won't be too long. This will be an exercise in self control for me to keep it concise, to not get bogged down in the details and to keep the plot moving. 
> 
> Your feedback will be appreciated so much but either way I hope you enjoy reading it. I don't know how often I'll work on this or where this is going really at the moment, but we'll see and I'll keep you updated with any plans.


	2. Chapter 2

!

Kakashi approached the three new genin lazily, more than aware he was three hours late. They hadn’t noticed him yet, each doing their own thing at the centre of Training Ground Three. 

Oh, three threes! Didn’t good things come in threes? Or was it bad things?

He gave a long suffering sigh as he mentally prepared for the eventuality of failing another genin team. Despite what people thought, he didn’t actually take joy in crushing the dreams of enthusiastic prepubescents; if they passed fair and square, he’d be their jounin-sensei as that’s what he’d agreed with the Hokage, but otherwise he wouldn’t waste his time.

He observed Team 7 from the shadows of the trees as they lay around and stretched lazily. 

Naruto Uzumaki: huge chakra reserves, the kyuubi jinchuuriki, minimal skill in ninjitsu, taijitsu or genjitsu, not particularly bright and likes pranks. Also, the child of his deceased sensei who he had once counted amongst his few precious people. 

Kakashi rubbed his chest gently as a wave of grief rose up. Moving on. 

Sasuke Uchiha: one of the few shinobi Uchiha in the village, motivated and with skills to back it up, above average chakra reserves, top of his year group in ninjitsu, taijitsu and genjitsu, seemed a bit bratty, hadn’t activated his sharingan yet. Also, Itachi had approached him the day before very seriously and told him in no uncertain terms would he unfairly fail Sasuke.

Kakashi gave his second long suffering sigh of the day and had a feeling this exasperated feeling would become a regular thing.

Nikko Sato: the most unassuming person he’d ever met, top kunoichi of her year group in ninjitsu, taijitsu and genjitsu, average chakra reserves and scored highest on the final written test. Apart from that there was literally nothing else in her file.

Well, at least Nikko didn’t have unsavoury strings attached, and having a smart, capable and down to earth person around was an unusual combination of skills for a ninja. 

Either way, he’d give the promised bell test to the three kids and see what they were fundamentally made of. He didn’t hold out much hope.

!

Ah, the bell test. She knew these rules and they could definitely win with her help. A part of her wondered if she actually did want to win and be on team 7. Of course she did, who was she kidding? It was pretty cool to be working with them, if not a little overwhelming, and she kind of knew what was going to happen around them so maybe she could survive it all. Maybe.

She had managed to convince the two boys to cooperate as soon as Kakashi-sensei had said ‘go’. Well, maybe not as soon as. Naruto had flown at their sensei, been given the hundred years of pain, and then been sent off into the sun in a team-rocket-esque finish. Sasuke and Nikko had jumped back into the tree line immediately, and before the Uchiha could disappear into the undergrowth she’d grabbed his arm and beckoned for him to follow her. He clearly didn’t want to, but she didn’t give him a choice as she jumped away still holding onto his upper arm.

They found Naruto covered in leaves and bark and slightly disorientated. Nikko motioned for them to hide under a bush and placed the standard area distortion genjitsu around them. They seemed annoyed at her but were clearly curious about what she was going to say.

“We need to work together,” she told them with a no-nonsense tone.

Sasuke looked at her as if she was stupid. “There are only two bells.”

“Yes, but this is a jounin. Alone we definitely can’t win, we’ve only just left the academy. Together, we also probably can’t win but at least we’ve got a chance.” She could see Sasuke still wasn’t convinced. 

“Well,” Nikko stated slowly, “Could we beat your brother in this scenario?” 

He pursed his lips and grunted. She had a point.

“Okay, sure thing Nikko!” Naruto announced, slightly too loudly and if they had actually been in enemy territory they would have been spotted instantly. She knew Kakashi probably already knew where they were anyway, so she wasn’t too worried, but she did shush him. She felt a little warm at the fact Naruto had just accepted her guidance so easily; well, they had been friends for years and he was a real sweetheart actually.

Twenty minutes later they stood with the two bells between them, having taken them from Kakashi because he’d clearly let them. Once he’d seen the three genin working together he’d changed tactics to see what they’d do next once they’d obtained the bells.

“So then, who’s it going to be?” he asked lightly.

Nikko gave a long suffering sigh, a bit like she’d heard Kakashi-sensei give at least three times as he’d observed their stumbling and messy teamwork. She stepped forward and put her hand up.

“Yeah, I’ll go back. Whatever,” she said with wry amusement. Behind her Naruto sputtered and began to protest.

“No, it should be the bastard, he doesn’t even want to be on this team!”

Sasuke snorted. “Maybe it should be the deadlast, you’re only here by the skin of your teeth.”

Nikko looked at Kakashi, who was doing the annoying eye smile thing again, and turned to address the two boys.

“I don’t mind guys, I’m not half as ambitious as you two. You really want this; I can wait another year,” Nikko told them gently, smiling a closed lip smile and shrugging with a ‘what can you do?’. 

“But that’s not fair, we’re a team! You came up with the ideas, you deserve this!” Naruto exclaimed, looking at the bell in his hand with watery eyes and a determined face. Then, unexpectedly for Nikko, he held out his hand with the bell and shoved it unceremoniously into her face. “You have it, you’re my friend and I’m not leaving you behind, believe it! I’ll still become Hokage even if I’ve got to go back to the academy, believe it!” 

He forced the bell upon a surprised Nikko and put his arms behind his head with a self-satisfied expression. Nikko was very confused.

Sasuke was the third person of the day to then give a long suffering sigh. “He’s right. You did come up with the plan, it’s unfair if you’re left behind. We wouldn’t even have made it this far without you.” The words looked sour in his mouth and he very unhappily handed the bell to the female member of the team, not giving her a chance to refuse as he shoved it in her hand. He stood back and folded his arms, looking off to the side moodily. Ahh, there’s the Sasuke she knew.

Nikko now had two bells and didn’t know what to do. She looked to Kakashi-sensei desperately, asking him for some help at the unexpected self-sacrifice from the two stand offish boys who had, just yesterday, ditched her at lunch. She couldn’t deny the little warm feeling in her chest that had begun to take hold.

Kakashi just gave another eye smile. Ergh, Nikko was coming to hate that expression.

Looking down at the bells in her hand she gave them a bewildered look and held them out to Kakashi to take. He accepted them happily, understanding her lack of words for a quiet decline of Naruto and Sasuke offer.

Kakashi covered his surprise well, but Nikko knew it was there.

“Well, you’re all going back to the academy them,” he told them nonchalantly, “are you sure two of you don’t want these bells?” 

He offered them out to the team but they all stood firm. Where this solidarity had come from was anyone’s guess, but maybe it was just part of their personality. They had an innate fairness in their soul. Sasuke probably saw taking the bell as an act of betrayal and Naruto had made a choice and no force on earth could make him change his mind.

Nikko knew the rules: they either all passed or none of them did. She was kind of cheating, but she was a ninja now so that was allowed.

After a beat where nobody took the bells, Kakashi stood up straighter.

“In that case…” he paused, and all three genin looked at him cautiously. “You all pass!”

Naruto cheered, Nikko smiled and Sasuke looked a little dumb struck. 

Nikko decided that this was a good day.

!

When Nikko was approached by Midori Uchiha for the first time, it was a week into being on her new genin team.

Their week had been running D-ranks in the mornings and team training in the afternoon. Kakashi tended to take them to the Hokage, pick the D-rank that would get them the most annoyed and frustrated, and then in the afternoon they would take all that pent up prepubescent anger and direct it at each other.

To be fair, it was a good tactic for getting them to work well under pressure. But Nikko was sure that he also did it because he liked to watch them suffer. He was clearly a little peeved still that he’d been lumbered with a genin team that had actually passed his test.

Team training was, for the most part, new information. Nikko really enjoyed learning and working with her team. Naruto made her laugh and Sasuke seemed to be a kindred spirit in his utter bewilderment at their blond teammate and their lazy sensei. It was an unlikely kinship.

Nikko was finding that the warm feeling in her chest kept coming back and growing bigger.

She hadn’t had any type of precious people in a while, not since before. She’d kept to herself, made some shallow friendships but nothing too deep, and just got on with life. She really hadn’t expected this.

She felt a little emotional sometimes over this feeling but didn’t want to fight it. She’d kind of come to terms with her life.

Mostly.

I mean, she still missed her loved ones from before.

Oh no, she was thinking about them again. She didn’t want to cry. Think happy thoughts! Naruto dog piling Kakashi with hundreds of clones when he was four hours late.

Hehe, that was pretty funny. Kakashi gave one of those long suffering sighs again. It was her new task to make him outwardly show his exasperation at them and encouraging Naruto was too easy.

By the end of the week they had the beginnings of a fair team. They learnt formations, counters and supportive attacks. Kakashi-sensei hadn’t shown them any new techniques as he was just trying to fine tune what they already knew. Naruto had extra homework to work on his katas and meditation, but apart from that they were pretty good.

Midori Uchiha approached her as she walked back to her apartment for some well-deserved sleep after a long day of D-ranks and training. 

“Hello there,” somebody said from behind her. They were in a park just the other side of the road from the genin apartments. It was pretty public; a few random joggers and dog walkers passed by and the street could be seen less than 50 metres away. Whoever this was wasn’t trying to corner her. In fact, they were almost definitely trying to show them they were not cornering her.

Nikko turned and came face to face with a generic looking Uchiha women. She was beautiful of course, as were all Uchiha as they had this stupidly perfect aesthetics gene pool apparently, but compared to others in her clan she was pretty average. 

Nikko couldn’t help but touch her mud brown shoulder cropped hair self-consciously as she looked at the pretty lady. She was a shinobi and a jounin, if the leaf hiatai and the jounin blues were anything to go by.

“Hi,” Nikko unintelligibly replied. The lady just smiled back kindly.

“I’m Midori Uchiha, you’re on a genin team with my nephew Sasuke,” Midori told her as way of introduction.

“Oh, nice to meet you, I’m Nikko Sato,” Nikko said, bowing respectively to the older kunoichi. 

“I wanted to invite you to something Nikko,” Midori said, “it’s a book club I run.”

“Oh, no thank you, I’m not really-” Nikko started, prepared to politely decline. She didn’t have the time to go to a book club, nor was she really interested.

“Would you please come?” Midori said, interrupting Nikko expertly, and giving her a very encoraging smile. “We meet on Wednesday evenings at the Akimichi BBQ house at the edge of town. It’s one of the less frequented joints but one of our members runs it,” Midori explained. “It’s generally invitation only, we only invite people who share a particular thought process.”

A particular thought process? “I don’t know if I-” 

Nikko was prompted interrupted again.

“Why don’t you come along anyway, we’re having a special meeting tomorrow night. See if it’s something you’ll enjoy. If you don’t like it you don’t have to come back, but give it a shot?” 

Nikko was beginning to feel a bit overwhelmed. This conversation was bordering on dramatic if she continued to decline, and if there was one thing she hated it was drama. If she just agreed to it now then she could go and then never go again and it would all be fine. Oh, she was so weak to pretty girls. And people that looked like they might keep going on. She needed more of a backbone but that required effort and probably led to drama.

“Okay, sure,” she said reluctantly, and was awarded with a winning smile from the Uchiha. “But… why are you inviting me?” Nikko had to ask as she was a bit confused about this fact. No one paid attention to her as she was, in Kakashi-sensei’s own words, a very unassuming person. Nikko was still unsure whether she should feel insulted by her sensei’s words or not.

“Oh well, Sasuke talked about you and you seem just the type of person who would benefit from our club.” Midori brushed past the question with a vague answer, but at least it explained where she’d heard about her from. They must be close if Sasuke talked to her about his team, but then again, he didn’t have that much family left.

Midori left her with a, “See you tomorrow night at 8pm, don’t be late,” and a scattering of leaves as she shunshied away. 

What a strange encounter. Well, whatever, her bed was calling her.

!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't expect to update so quickly but I was feeling inspired when I woke up this morning, but don't expect such frequent updates usually I just have some spare time at the moment. I hope you enjoyed this chapter, it was pretty fun to write actually, and I feel like I'm getting to know Nikko more and more as I develop her. I'm doing this on a chapter by chapter basis at the moment, I don't really know where this is going though I do have some ideas. Lets see shall we! Anyway, thanks for reading and leave a comment if you can to tell me what you think.


	3. Chapter 3

!

“I heard you’re going to my Aunt Midori’s book club,” Sasuke stated as they trudged tiredly across the village for the fifth time that morning. Their D-rank was to help an elderly person move to a new house and they were unfortunately a hoarder. 

“Yeah,” Nikko said hesitantly, she still didn’t really know what to think about the whole situation. “What’s that about?”

“There are civilians and ninja in the club. Midori said it’s a way of making connections across the village with likeminded people.” Sasuke sounded fondly exasperated as he said this.

“Is it a big club then?” 

“No, but it’s really boring according to Shisui. He went once and refused all invites thereafter,” Sasuke explain, shivering as a memory seemed to surface in his mind. 

“Nikko’s pretty boring so she’ll probably fit right in,” Naruto announced from her left, carrying a fridge as if it was a perfectly easy and normal thing to do. 

Wait, did he just call her boring?

“I’m not boring!” Nikko protested, readjusting the box of books in her hand. “I’m just not as boisterous as all of you.” 

“Don’t worry Nikko, I’d say you’re more unassuming than boring,” Kakashi piped in. He was walking with the little orange book open in from of his face, having refused to carry any of the furniture with the excuse of ‘team building’.

Nikko slumped. She wasn’t boring, they’re so mean. She was just way more down to earth than an elite jounin, the kyuubi jinchuuriki and the Uchiha heir. 

! 

At 8 o’clock on the dot Nikko found herself standing outside the Akimichi BBQ house on the edge of town. She entered the old style building and was immediately approached by a server.

“Err… I’m here for a book club?” Nikko told the young man, who nodded in understanding and led her to a door at the back of the restaurant. The establishment was half full of patrons and decorated with dark wood and low lighting, the air thick with cigarette smoke and the seating open and spacious.

The server gestured Nikko to continue through the door and left her just as quickly as he’d arrived. The whole situation felt very mysterious and that she might be entering an 1800’s opium den instead of a book club. 

Knowing there was no way to avoid this strange encounter since she’d already arrived, she opened the door, hesitating only for a moment as she contemplated whether to knock or not and deciding against it, and peeked her head around the corner of the door cautiously.

She noted there were seven people sitting at a long table that could probably hold double the amount seated currently. The room had a door on the left with a ‘staff only’ sign painted on and on the other two walls traditional sliding doors that led onto only softwood decking. 

Midori seemed to notice Nikko quickly from her seat on the other side of the table and stood up with a wide smile. “Nikko!” she exclaimed.

Nikko gave a closed lip smile and stepped completely into the room. She gave small polite bow to the room before she was shepherded to sit opposite the Uchiha by a dark haired chunin, probably around her mid-teens, who then took a seat next her and introduced herself a Magumi Tanaka. 

“Let me just introduce you to everyone,” Midori said. First, she gestured to a well-dressed man with long sandy hair. “To your left is Hiro Hori, he’s a merchant in the clothing district. On your right is, as she said, Magumi Tanaka who is a chunin in the Hokage tower.”

“Classic paper ninja,” joked a tired looking man in jounin blues and a bandana at the end of the table. Megumi stuck her tongue out childishly at the jounin who chuckled good naturedly.

“This joker is Hayate Gekkou, a Tokubetsu Jounin,” Midori interrupted, rolling her eyes. She then gestured to the woman on her left who was wearing a traditional pink kimono and an elaborate up-do. “This here is Yua Suzuki, she is a lady in waiting for the daimyo’s wife.” Yua gave Nikko a shy little wave and Nikko found herself raising her hand in reply subconsciously. 

Dammit Nikko, why do you have such a weakness for pretty girls?

“You obviously know who I am,” Midori continued, “and on my right is Tomoe Nara.”

The Nara sat lazily back in their chair and gave a slow blink in reply. Nikko spent a moment trying to figure out their gender but came up blank. They adorned the classic black ponytail most Nara favoured and looked at Nikko calmly with bright, half-lidded eyes. 

“Ahh Tomoe, be more welcoming to our newest member,” said a jounin as they slapped Tomoe hard on the back, making them splutter and sit up from their slouch.

“This is Inoichi Yamanaka,” Midori introduced the last person at the table. Nikko blinked once as she recognised the name but other than that just gave a tight lipped, polite smile to the man who happily smiled back at her.

“Supper is ready!” a booming voice announced as the staff door opened to reveal a beast of a man in an orange apron. At least seven foot and with a heavy gut, he was the metaphorical as well as literal meaning of larger than life. 

“Finally,” Tomoe said, sitting up a bit straighter as the Akimichi put down a try with several platters of food. 

“This is Chibi Akimichi, the last of our book club,” Midori told her, reaching over to pull the food further up the table. 

“You much be Nikko,” Chibi announced as he caught sight of her and beamed, “please help yourself to the spread, we usually start the club by filling our stomachs.”

“Thank you,” Nikko said quietly, feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the whole experience.

Oh god, she shouldn’t have come. Why did she go? Because she’s a really weak person. 

The room seemed to hum gently with quiet voices and Nikko was dragged into a conversation with the chunin Megumi very quickly. It was small talk mostly, which Nikko could definitely do. Megumi went on mostly about the preparation for the chunin exams and all the paperwork for foreign dignitaries. She had only made chunin herself the previous year and had lots of ideas about who might be competing who didn’t pass last time.

Hayate jumped in a few times with comments about the work for a proctor being harder than a paperwork ninja, which caused Megumi to go on a tirade about the importance of bureaucracy. 

Nikko took note of the whispered conversation between Chibi, Hiro and Inoichi in the corner and the way Midori glanced searchingly in her direction every few minutes. 

When the small meal was finished and the plates cleared away, it seemed as if it was time to get down to business. 

Midori cleared the throat to call for everyone attention and held up a red bound book with a title etched in gold ink on the cover. “We are reading this book this week, by our very own Hiro Hori,” Midori stated, clearly the leader of the group in general and the chair for their meetings. “It’s titled ‘Harry Potter’.”

The room was silent as each person reached forward and picked up a copy of the book from a pile that had miraculously appeared at the centre of the table. Nikko blinked. And then blinked again, trying to mask her surprise.

Harry Potter?  
Nikko picked up the book and blinked again, noting that the title was in roman letters and not the Japanese characters she had grown accustomed to.

“Is this book not to your liking? I’ve written other books to. ‘Lord of the Rings’ is a popular one. Or ‘Pride and Prejudice’ is popular amongst the ladies, if you like a Mr. Darcy character I suppose,” Hiro said casually. His voice was smooth and rich, matching his aristocratic good looks well. What didn’t make sense though was what he was saying. The contents were strange of course, but there was something else.

He looked at her expectantly. 

They were all looking at her expectantly.

Oh, she understood now. Hiro hadn’t spoken Japanese. 

Nikko was so utterly confused she was bordering on panicked. She hadn’t just heard English. Nope, no. Definitely not. This was too weird. Nope.

“I’m sorry, but I seem to be having some type of severe hallucination and I’m going to go home,” Nikko announced, tired of the farce and deciding she was way out of her depth. She didn’t know if any of this was real, but she’d leave now and decide later when she was at a safe distance. She quickly stood from her chair, ridged and disoriented, but before she could stumble to the door, she was grabbed by the wrist by Midori who had stood at the same time and reached across the table.

“No, don’t!” Midori exclaimed, looking a little bit worried. “I’m sorry, we just needed to check...” Midori didn’t let go and Nikko didn’t try to make her. Instead staring at her as if she had grown another head.

“You’re speaking English…” Nikko muttered, not realizing herself that she’d slipped back into her previous life’s language. 

No one dared more an inch as they stared at Nikko with wide, waiting eyes. 

“I knew it!” Inoichi exclaimed, reverting back to Japanese, slapping his hand down hard onto the table with a joyful shout and disrupting the tense atmosphere abruptly.

“Yeah yeah, whatever,” Tomoe replied, reaching into their back pocket and fishing out a wallet. They reached in and pulled out a hefty amount of money before handing it too the Yamanaka clan head. 

“I told you I could spot them, I found that girl in tea country last month, didn’t I?”

“You literally specialize in reading people for a living.”

“Don’t take away my win,” pouted Inoichi.

“I don’t understand,” Nikko said slowly, a little bit of panic rising in her chest as the mood seemed to make such a large transformation.

“Shut up you two,” snapped Midori, still holding onto Nikko’s wrist as if scared she’d run away. They promptly closed their mouths.

Midori turned her attention on Nikko who just stared back, not really sure what she was about to say. “Will you please hear us out?” Midori asked, gesturing for her to sit back down. She released her hand and slowly sat down. Nikko reluctantly did the same. 

Nikko was pretty sure you weren’t supposed to interact with hallucinations, but this probably wasn’t a hallucination. Maybe.

“You see, Nikko, we’re all like you,” Midori started, haltingly. “We’ve lived before.” 

Nikko did a slow blink. “Right,” she said, indicating she was listening, and neither denying nor agreeing with the statement. Midori seemed to take this as a good sign. The rest of the room remained silent and focused on the conversation and Nikko’s reactions.

“I’ll tell you about my own experience, and you can decide whether to trust us with yours,” she said. Midori took a breath and Yua placed a reassuring hand on her arm. Then she began her story.

Midori had remembered her past life when she was about six years of age. She had once been called Eleanor Park and had been in her first year of university studying history when she’d died. 

This was all she mentioned about who she had been, the subject obviously painful and not the point of what she had to say.

When she realized she had lived before she began to recognise the world from a TV show she watched in her past life. The symbols on the headbands, the Uchiha fan, the Hokage monument were all part of that show, but the familiarity didn’t quite hit until the night of the Kyuubi attack. Midori was terrified and confused, but it all felt really odd in a different way, and when it was all over and there was a blond baby boy with whiskers on his face that contained the nine-tailed-fox Midori finally, completely remembered.

Naruto.

From here she began to write down what she recalled and was shocked when she uncovered the Uchiha Massacre; the death of all her loved ones by the hands of Itachi Uchiha. Something had to be done.

Here she skipped over some of the details, probably classified information, but concluded that eventually with the help of her fiancée Shisui Uchiha they circumvented Danzo’s master plan to kill off the Uchiha clan and orchestrated an ambush with the Hokage to quiet down the rebellion. The clan had been given an out, but most decided to die with their honour.

It was around this time that Midori came in contact with Inoichi. At the mention of his name the Yamanaka clan head gave a little wave. Apparently, it was Inoichi who discovered Midori’s secret and shared in turn that he also has memories of his past life. He had never mentioned it to anyone as he didn’t think it was something he should share; he just got on with his life. What did shock him was her knowledge of events that may happen, and they knew they must work together to make Konoha a better place. However, they quickly realized they couldn’t tell anyone about their previous lives; it would put them in the spotlight, with targets on their back and a scapegoat if things ever went wrong. The fear of discovery was too real.

No, they couldn’t tell anyone. Instead, they put their heads together and concluded there must be more people like them out there who they could share their knowledge with and help them. They wanted to make a safe space, to talk about all the things they couldn’t anywhere else, and to help each other where others couldn’t. They found Hiro and Chibi not long after that, then Hayate and Yua. Then Tomoe and Megumi just last year. 

“So, you see, we’ve all been through it. Being confused and alone. But that’s why we started this group, so we didn’t have to do it alone; this world is very unlike our previous one and is so much more volatile. You don’t have to give us an answer now, and we won’t share what we know about you’re past, but we also ask you don’t do the same. Everything in this room stays in this room. 

“But, if you’d like, you can join us.”

And with these words Nikko promptly burst into tears.

“Oh, I didn’t think there’d be waterworks,” Hayate said, both with distaste and panic.

“I’m a pubescent girl, fuck off,” Nikko sneered back, earning a snigger from Megumi as she patted Nikko’s back in reassurance. “Sorry, this isn’t what I expected when I came here today.” She admitted, taking the offered tissue from Hiro.

Her emotional outburst seemed to break something in the room and Nikko could see a few smiles and generally a more relaxed atmosphere.

“It’s okay, I cried too,” Megumi admitted, “it’s all a bit overwhelming to know you’re not alone.”

Overwhelming was a complete understatement. 

!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heya everyone! I'm a little bit not happy with this chapter but I wanted to move forward as I don't want to get bogged down with the details too much. It was fun coming up with who was going to be part of the club and I'm happy with the outcome. Also, I like the idea of a few named characters being in the club, but more on everyone back stories and knowledge in a later chapter; this was only supposed to be an introductory character to the club. I'm also excited to have a genderless character in my fic, it'll be fun to get to know Tomoe! Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it!


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